Scream kicks off with Matrix launch and two challenging panels

The Scream Literary Festival, now in its 15th year, is hosting two inspiring events in Toronto as part of its July 3 to 9th run. "As always," they say, "the festival reaches its boiling point with The Scream in High Park, Canada's largest single-night outdoor reading, on July 9."

(Both events may be interesting not only to literary and cultural magazine publishers but also to their hard-pressed poetry contributors.)

• One event is a panel, moderated by Clive Thompson (former editor of This Magazine, now a frequent contributor to the New York Times Magazine) called "Strange Alchemy: the Science and Poetry Panel." Panellists include Christian Bök, angela rawlings, Ken Babstock and postdoctoral candidate, Lisa Betts (who is studying the neuroscience of vision at York). It's being held Wednesday, July 4 at the Supermarket, 268 Augusta Avenue in Kensington Market at 7 p.m. The panel is followed at 9 p.m. with a launch of the newest issue of the Montreal-based magazine Matrix magazine, with readings by the panel members.

• The other event is a panel discussing the state of poetry criticism called "Under the Microscope", to be held at Tinto, 89 Roncesvalles Avenue at 3 p.m. The panel includes New York Times critic David Orr, music critic and Zoilus.com creator Carl Wilson, and poets Elizabeth Bachinsky and Damian Rogers, discussing why poetry is missing from popular critical consciousness. The panel is moderated by Toronto writer Marianne Apostolides and will question whether the lack of conversation about poetry is due to a failure of critics, not a failure of poets.